For years I've thought about doing an "art project" to make people more aware of the fact they are being observed – but I never actually got up and did it.

The idea was to seek spots in the city where public web cams are pointed at, and paint QR codes on the ground at those spots (using a template), linking to the camera stream. So when curious passerbys scan the code, they see themselves in a camera stream and feel "watched".

I had thought about creating a larger roadside banner with the faces (pulled from voters guide) of the city council members who approved Flock, along with the face of the Sheriff with something along the lines of "These people want to know where your wife and daughter are at all times - deflock.me" and place it right next to the Flock camera.

Gotta tag some political organization on the banner which makes it illegal to remove.

Not exactly the same, but Massive Attack had some facial recognition software running in the background during a concert to illustrate how pervasive modern day surveillance is: https://petapixel.com/2025/09/17/band-massive-attack-uses-li...

Belgian artist Dries Depoorter has something that comes close, where he tried to match public webcams against Instagram photos. See https://driesdepoorter.be/thefollower .

Years ago there was a YouTuber, "Surveillance Camera Man," who went around pointing a camera at people with no pretense. Frequently the subjects were upset by this and became aggressive, even violent. I believe the intended message was that this is a natural and justified reaction to being surveilled, and yet there is little outcry because public surveillance is largely invisible and/or faceless (e.g. just a CCTV camera mounted on a building, rather than a stranger invading your personal space).

The YouTube account is no longer around, but you can still watch it on archive.org: https://web.archive.org/web/20190220131525/https://www.youtu...

"... and paint QR codes on the ground at those spots ..."

This is what "Oh By Codes"[1] are for.

Instead of trying to paint a QR code, which is difficult, you can just chalk a 6 character code.

Further, you can create them on the fly without using a special tool - just a textarea on a simple webpage.

You can encode up to 4096 characters or a single URL redirect.

[1] https://0x.co

I remember seeing an art project in the UK ~10 years ago where they had actors enact a short film but everything was filmed using street cameras, which IIRC everyone could request access to with little bureaucracy.

A better "art project" would be a alpr that detects police and municipal vehicles and reports them to a map criminals and citizens alike can see

What, are those streams publicly accessible?

I'm only aware of boring rooftop weather webcams where obv you can't see yourself.

Any examples for what you speak of?

There's probably several interesting ways to make a QR code on the ground with chalk. I'm thinking of a turtle bot loaded with spray chalk, for starters.

And this post uses wire screen to make a stencil https://www.instructables.com/Simple-QR-Code-Spray-Paint-Ste...

I'd like to start a standard marking of some sort to call them out. A hot pink arrow drawn with spray paint on the pole is the first thing that came to mind.

Could use projectors to display the feed directly onto the ground or a building wall, in some ways that may be more impactful. You'd have to stay with the projector and power source, but easier to move to the next location, and less of a chance of getting in trouble for defacing public property, etc.

I see a meeting tonight in a neighboring city with a council recommendation of approve. Timely

Joke's on you... even most EVs watch everyone and everything that they pass/passes them. Walking through the parking lot ... face recognition.

Welcome to prison planet, the silly conspiracy theory that only weirdos believe in 1990.

damn that’s a good idea